Abortion
My Mother Aborted My Siblings, And That Hurts Me Deeply by Anonymous – “I thought I was an only child because of my mother’s chronic illness. But then I found what really happened.”
Cecile Richards Says She Doesn’t Know When an Unborn Baby Gets Constitutional Rights by Cortney O’Brien
Why would, how could, anyone defend Planned Parenthood? by Dave Andrusko
Bioethics
A visit to a baby market in Brussels by Stephanie Raeymaekers – “A donor-conceived Belgian woman visits a fair for same-sex couples who want to be dads”
Contraception
News That Shocks No One: Hormonal Birth Control Is Linked To Depression by Jennifer Doverspike – “A new study that finds a big correlation between hormonal birth control use and depression diagnoses validates women’s concerns that many health professionals have long ignored.”
End-of-Life
Woman In Coma Wiggles Toe Right Before Being Removed From Life Support
Euthanasia: learn from Canada’s mistakes by Will Johnston – “Now that doctors may kill, will people become terrified of palliative care?”
Why Are Suicide Rates Climbing after Years of Decline? by Nancy Valko
Family Living
Eyes of Life – Kacey – “Meet Kacey, a single mom who chose life for her unborn son, Leo, now a joyful toddler who reminds her each day of the ‘hope and redemption found in Christ.’”
Eyes of Life – Norman – “Meet the Rev. Dr. Norman Nagel – well known professor, pastor and preacher – who, despite suffering the effects of a stroke, rejoices in Christ’s gifts of value, worth and honor.”
Old Folks Just Might Know Something by Rev. Mark Jeske
8 Ways To De-Stress Your Pregnancy by Georgi Boorman – “Strangely, I feel as comfortable in my own skin now as I ever did, stretch marks and all.”
If You Regret Having A Child, Don’t Blame The Child — Get Help by Joy Pullman – “The ladies’ mag Marie Claire has published an article about a ‘growing movement’ of mothers who wish their babies had never been born. These women need help, not child erasers.”
Reach Out To Women Like Me With Postpartum Depression by Vanessa Rasanen – “Many mothers struggle with postpartum depression in silence—fearful of judgment, or grappling with shame and doubt. We need to change that.”
It’s The Truth That Keeps You Going, Even When Motherhood Hurts by Gracy Olmstead – “Why sacrifice comfort, success, and pleasure to raise children? Society says we should follow our feelings; C.S. Lewis says we should pursue virtue.”
Traveling On Planes Is Actually Better With Kids by Emma Elliott Freire – “I have now taken 14 flights (a total of 78 hours in the air) with my daughter as a lap infant. And I would always rather fly with her than by myself.”
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“Postmodern Psychological Parenting Is Causing More Harm Than Good”
by Dr. John Rosemond
(Source: John Rosemond, October Newsletter, 10/3/16, www.rosemond.com)
In the late 1960s, America came to a fork in the parenting road and took the road never traveled. My generation did what no generation in any culture at any time in history had ever done: we broke with the parenting traditions of our foremothers and forefathers. When the time came, we refused to take the well-worn parenting baton and carry it forward. And as poet Robert Frost foresaw, albeit upside-down, it has made all of the difference.
The new parenting paradigm was driven by an odd hybrid of humanistic, behavioral, and Freudian theories. I call it Postmodern Psychological Parenting (PPP). Like all postmodern stuff, it is relativistic (do your own thing) and progressive (full of new ideas). It is psychological because it’s all about feelings-the child’s, that is. It’s parenting because it’s an expert-driven quasi-technology. All told, it is one-hundred-and-eighty-degrees removed from the day when common sense ruled child rearing and one’s elders were the go-to advisors.
The new parenting experts implied, strongly, that good parenting was all about properly interpreting and responding to a child’s feelings. (The canard being that pre-1960s parents did not allow their children to freely express their feelings [true], thus causing them untold psychic damage [false].) That understanding caused the more emotionally-intuitive of the child-rearing pair to begin believing that she alone was capable of properly executing the new set of assignments and, therefore, broke the child-rearing unity of husband and wife. As a result, what was now “mothering” became what raising a child had never before been except in unusual circumstances: stressful, anxiety- and guilt-ridden, frustrating, and exhausting. That is, hard.
One of the more destructive consequences of PPP is the tendency on the part of today’s parents-especially moms-to assign legitimacy to their children’s emotional expressions. The typical mom of the 1950s-mine, for example-understood that children were drama factories and that children needed discipline concerning not only their behavior, but their feelings and thoughts as well. By contrast, today’s parents tend to (a) only discipline behavior, thus teaching their children how to manipulate and (b) buy into their children’s dramas and unwittingly enable narcissistic emotional expressions.
In this context, it should surprise no one that many a young child comes to school with the emotional control of a toddler. Nor should it surprise anyone that many teens seem to believe that a life without drama is a life without meaning. In case the reader has failed to notice, social media is the stage upon which many of these teen soap operas are produced. Furthermore, the emotionally-abusive child (whose default victim is his or her increasingly-guilty mother) has become ubiquitous.
America is paying a terrible price for believing that capital letters after one’s name means the individual in question knows what he’s talking about, for believing that new ideas are better than old ideas, for believing that if we are willing to listen, children will tell us what they need.
The truth is that yesterday’s grandparents gave much better advice than today’s experts, there is nothing new under the sun, and children only know what they want.
How to raise an emotional tyrant: Feed the beast.
Orphan Care
If You Want To Be A Foster Parent, You Need To Know The Truth by Traci Schmidley – “Welcoming foster kids into your home may not be easy or heartwarming. It may break your heart, and threaten to break your family.”
Worldview and Culture
This Amazing Teacher Invited Her Special Ed Class to Be in Her Wedding by Lang Thomas Photography – “And the photos are so, so sweet.”
Sally Phillips: Why my son’s Down’s syndrome reminds me of God
Why character no longer counts in presidential biographies for children by Stephanie Cohen – “Biographies for children used to have lofty ambitions.”
LGBT Is not a Color – Stop Hijacking Civil Rights by John Stonestreet – “Are sexual orientation and gender identity the same as race? That message is being snuck in all over the place.”
Homeschooling, the Feds, and You – Who Knows Best? by John Stonestreet – “Was this a warning shot? Or just a misinformed opinion? Homeschooling parents want to know.”
Massachusetts Law Could Jail Pastors For Using The Wrong Pronouns by Bre Payton
The Web and Our Humanity – Take Time Away from the Screen by John Stonestreet – “Who doesn’t love the Internet? News, entertainment, shopping, connecting with friends? But what is it doing to our souls?”
This and That